Thursday, 31 January 2013

Over the last five posts I have
discussed the various ways to elicit sympathy from the reader. But in all of
these cases, it is possible to heighten the effect simply by showing the
character to be undeserving of the punishment he’s being forced to undergo.

We all have an innate sense of
right and wrong. Even when life proves to be oblivious to this idea, and
even when we ourselves treat others unjustly, for some reason we cling to this
concept of fairness.

Unfairness can come from a
person, an institution or the universe. There’s no real logic behind why we
expect good things to happen to good people and bad people to be punished
(experience certainly doesn’t suggest either will happen very often), but we
do. And this means a character who is treated unfairly is one who is probably
going to win the sympathy of the reader.

Monday, 28 January 2013

One of the sharpest pains we feel
on behalf of a character is when they are betrayed. In order for the reader to
feel this pain, they need to know who the betrayer is. The closer the relationship
between the character and the betrayer, the greater their pain and the greater our
sympathy.

A story that focuses on finding
out who the traitor is—a mystery—usually reveals their identity
near the end of the story, at which point the reader and the main character
discover the truth together.

In terms of creating sympathy you can use to draw the reader into the story, that's too late to be of much use.

When it comes to sympathy, the
sooner you reveal the betrayal and who's responsible, the better.

Thursday, 24 January 2013

There’s something very attractive
about the outsider character. Being rejected and having to strike out alone
feels quite romantic.

The main things to remember when developing this sort of
character is to show how happy everyone inside the group is (even if they’re
just kidding themselves), and to demonstrate clearly that the character is not welcome.

Humans, as a whole, crave
belonging. We want to be accepted into the group, to obtain status and be listened to.

People who reject the mainstream and become Goths or
nerds or B-boys are still looking for a gang to call their own. We form
societies both in small, familial group, and large metropolises.

And each of
these has its rules and hierarchies and cliques, even the ones that claim they
don’t.

It hits deep when membership to
any sort of club is either rejected or revoked.

Monday, 21 January 2013

So far in this series on creating
sympathy, I’ve dealt with the extreme end of the spectrum. Danger and
suffering are pretty broad, easy to grasp concepts. Readers who encounter these
will find it hard to resist feeling concern for the characters in the story.
However, they are also quite simplistic and blunt, and once the immediate
danger/suffering passes, the concern for them will also.

There are more subtle ways
to evoke sympathy in the reader. When readers work out what’s going on for
themselves, it often has a more powerful and lasting effect than the more
obvious methods described already.

Someone who is pretending not to
be hurt or upset, immediately interests a reader. If your character is lonely
and unhappy but acts like they’re perfectly fine in front of others, that kind
of behaviour can be both appealing and intriguing.

Thursday, 17 January 2013

When it comes to feeling sympathy, our emotion are hardwired to be triggered by the distress of others.

It can be tempting to avoid
putting your characters (especially the ones you like) in too much pain and
agony. Whether physical or mental, any kind of suffering can feel like a
betrayal of characters you’ve become very fond of.

Unfortunately, if you don’t put
them through the wringer their problems will seem minor and not worth worrying
about.

Monday, 14 January 2013

This first part of this series on
creating emotional attachment between readers and characters is going to look
at engendering sympathy, and in this particular post, by putting characters in
risky situations. If you want the reader to feel concern for the characters in
your story, putting them in danger is a simple way to do it.

Any time something of value is on
the line, how the situation plays out will be of interest, and that is true for
all the parties involved. But if you can communicate what’s at stake and make
the reader as keen to avoid that outcome as the character, then it will amplify
the level of interest in what happens next.

Thursday, 10 January 2013

The story you’re writing may have
the kind of lead character that people automatically root for. He may be a good
guy doing the right thing; or a decent woman trying to sort out something that
needs sorting. Heroic behaviour and overcoming adversity can bypass the whole
need to tell the reader this is someone to cheer on. It’s obvious.

But they might be a little more
complex than that. Maybe flawed, maybe even a bit awkward. Or they may not get
to their heroic moment until much later in the story. How do you get the reader
on board as quickly as possible without having to add ‘stick with it, things
get good later’ at the bottom of each page?

Thursday, 3 January 2013

Nobody likes a perfect character.
Someone who is super good at everything and gets everything right is annoying.

Even the most suave secret agents
of indestructible superheroes need to make mistakes in order to make the story
interesting.

There are two parts to using
wrongness in a story. There’s the actual mistake (which sometimes isn’t known
to be a mistake at the time), and there’s the consequences of the mistake,
usually forcing the character to deal with powerful feeling of guilt or regret.